if you could hear the curses!!

[tylerd]

I love how people who have never probally worked in IT know everything about servers and websites, a 5000 person forum is much easier then a store.

every other area of the 'store' was not accessible because the process was streamlined, leaving just the ordering and checkout process creating the load.
the problem, that occurred, whatever it was, basically disabled the entire website for almost an hour.

you don't have to work in it to know that this was a problem for customers. don't it guys get paid good money to make sure this doesn't happen by making sure the system can handle this type of load, whether through software, hardware, or proper setup? if everyone were held personally accountable for their own actions, there would be less excuses in this world. jmho and observation.

 

[tylerd]

Yeah, databases are wicked resource hogs!!!


... and, Sideshow is actually still a small company. I believe their "store" servers are hosted in England actually, last time I checked, so it may not have even been their IT staff involved.

no kidding? weird something as vital as store servers half a world away from the home office. not the way i would want my company set up. so sideshow doesn't own their servers and just leases, or do they have a location in england to house them?

 

[Memnoch]

i think SS may (MAY) have a few onsite because I remember we got a picture of the server burning after Anakin. There is also the bottle neck problem. No matter how fantastic your network is, if you have 1000 people trying to access the same exact page RIGHT when the order goes up, of course problems will happen. Now imagine the chaos if it just went up and wasnt streamlined.

 

[tylerd]

Now take out licensing fees, staff wages, payments for their warehouse facilites, materials costs, shipping costs...

equipment maintenance and upgrades..an internet company that sells to the public is only as strong as their servers and connection outside their wiring closet, no? i'm not looking to praise or flame sideshow. i didn't even order obi in yesterday's ordeal, but i did personally witness the aftermath a bad ordering experience created for someone. not pretty.

 

[Memnoch]

I would think no, the company isn't as strong as its servers. There were other ways to get your order in, phone and fax jump out at me and I believe were mentioned on the board or in the newsletter. I give you a challange, look up the cost to upgrade from what YOU think SS current server and processing abilites are to what you think it should be. You would be suprised at how fast good servers go up in price.

 

[tylerd]

I would think no, the company isn't as strong as its servers. There were other ways to get your order in, phone and fax jump out at me and I believe were mentioned on the board or in the newsletter. I give you a challange, look up the cost to upgrade from what YOU think SS current server and processing abilites are to what you think it should be. You would be suprised at how fast good servers go up in price.

with due respect, that would be an exercise in futility. without knowing exactly what sideshow has, you couldn't begin to know what they need. probably no one enjoyed yesterday's crash so based on that and that alone, sideshow should 'invest' in whatever it takes not to have it happen again. in my teens, i had a lawn business. i had to buy a mower and when i got too many accounts, i had to buy a better mower to handle the additional accounts. eventually i also had to hire another guy to help me because the work was too much for me alone. i believe the same concept hold true in this case. the extra business=more money made and more money spent.

 

[Memnoch]

Ah but there is the rub, SS isn't getting extra buisness. In fact I would wager to say that at this time they are slower than they were a year to two years ago. Right now the two major licenses they have are Marvel which sees few releases and Star Wars which is a licensing nightmare. They no longer produce Buffy, Angel, POTA, military figures, and the Dead is a line that could explode but SS isn't doing it that way. Also, you say exercise in futility but make claims that SS needs to upgrade their servers. I would wager to say, based on that, you merely think they should upgrade to make it easier to log in and not upgrade based on any technical knowlege of what system they are running on. I still stand by my thinking that no matter what they upgrade to, unless they could have almost an entire floor of dedicated servers, i.e. one per ordering customer, there is still the bottle neck problem and slow down. In my view SS just isn't pulling in enough at the moment to do a massive network upgrade.

 

[tylerd]

Ah but there is the rub, SS isn't getting extra buisness. In fact I would wager to say that at this time they are slower than they were a year to two years ago. Right now the two major licenses they have are Marvel which sees few releases and Star Wars which is a licensing nightmare. They no longer produce Buffy, Angel, POTA, military figures, and the Dead is a line that could explode but SS isn't doing it that way. Also, you say exercise in futility but make claims that SS needs to upgrade their servers. I would wager to say, based on that, you merely think they should upgrade to make it easier to log in and not upgrade based on any technical knowlege of what system they are running on. I still stand by my thinking that no matter what they upgrade to, unless they could have almost an entire floor of dedicated servers, i.e. one per ordering customer, there is still the bottle neck problem and slow down. In my view SS just isn't pulling in enough at the moment to do a massive network upgrade.

recently i read on this board that sideshow dropped those lines because the popularity faded, and are now concentrating on their best selling and most popular lines. i have to believe that true.

the bottle neck problem could be caused by many unknown variables, because we don't exactly know sideshow's network setup. if it were my company i'd buy a few racks of on-site servers and add fiber optic throughout. that way they could do all they can to make their setup as efficient as possible. if indeed they are paying a server host all the way in england, that may be the problem.

 

[Memnoch]

Popularity of military figures will never ever fade. Go over to 1/6 Warriors and tell them military figures aren't popular anymore. Buffy suffered because the lack of releases and the inability for newcommers to the line (me included) to get main characters at a decent cost. Fiber optics are expensive and fragile, ridiculously on both ends. Right now it may be cheaper for SS to be leasing server space in England than have a fully dedicated server bank in Thousand Oaks, again, we don't know.

And on a side note, I can't believe my IT knowledge is actually of use finally.

 

[Kookie]

no kidding? weird something as vital as store servers half a world away from the home office. not the way i would want my company set up. so sideshow doesn't own their servers and just leases, or do they have a location in england to house them?

Was you previous board name Kodiak...just curious?

Also...could I have the link to your business? Please stop trying to convince people that Sideshow doesn't know what their doing with the servers or that people don't know what their doing there. This happens very rarely and many long time collectors can verify that. Accidents happen and nothing is fool proof. Lcummins is an IT guy and give a much better explaination on what happened than I can. At the end of the day it's really not a big deal, I'm sure 99% of the people that wanted the exclusive got one and if not they are pretty much guaranteed to get one on the waitlist. Worse case scenerio if you didn't get one Tylerd is I'll sell you mine.

 

[user 1190]

you don't have to work in it to know that this was a problem for customers. don't it guys get paid good money to make sure this doesn't happen by making sure the system can handle this type of load, whether through software, hardware, or proper setup? if everyone were held personally accountable for their own actions, there would be less excuses in this world. jmho and observation.

Yes some IT people get paid really good money. Buying something that should handle a certain load is easy, but testing that is VERY hard. I use to do QC for software co and had to this kind of load testing. All the fake traffic you can make is still not the same a the real thing as we found out.

 

[tylerd]

Was you previous board name Kodiak...just curious?

Also...could I have the link to your business? Please stop trying to convince people that Sideshow doesn't know what their doing with the servers or that people don't know what their doing there. This happens very rarely and many long time collectors can verify that. Accidents happen and nothing is fool proof. Lcummins is an IT guy and give a much better explaination on what happened than I can. At the end of the day it's really not a big deal, I'm sure 99% of the people that wanted the exclusive got one and if not they are pretty much guaranteed to get one on the waitlist. Worse case scenerio if you didn't get one Tylerd is I'll sell you mine.

i don't understand what you're getting at but i believe you're trying to insult me with a private joke and i don't appreciate your attempt to bully me.

i witnessed first hand someone not having a good experience yesterday. that's why i started the thread. people are smart enough to come to their own conclusions. i would like to request that this thread be locked by a moderator.

 

[Kookie]

i don't understand what you're getting at but i believe you're trying to insult me with a private joke and i don't appreciate your attempt to bully me.

i witnessed first hand someone not having a good experience yesterday. that's why i started the thread. people are smart enough to come to their own conclusions. i would like to request that this thread be locked by a moderator.

ohh geez...relax...your probably on the phone with the ACLU as we speak.